Times Square New Years Eve

Times Square New Years Eve, Giuliana Rancic is ready to say goodbye to the past and hello to her future. The “E! News” host, who recently underwent a double mastectomy, is set to join her husband, Bill Rancic, in New York’s Times Square on New Year’s Eve to usher in 2012.

“This has been a very difficult year for them. But they agreed months ago to host the Nivea ‘Kiss of a Lifetime’ contest, where America’s most deserving couple will join them in Times Square on New Year’s Eve for the year’s most spectacular kiss, and that’s exactly what they intend to do,” a friend of the couple tells me. “Of course, after Giuliana’s surgery they discussed moving forward with the event, and have decided there is nowhere they would rather be than standing strong and in love together to ring in the New Year.”

Giuliana, who will announce the Nivea contest winners on NBC’s New Year’s Eve telecast, has thanked fans for their prayers as she recovers from her surgery.

“My big surgery was exactly one week ago today (December 13),” she tweeted. “I’m recovering better than I had hoped thanks in big part to your prayers & love.”

Giuliana returned to work at E! after Christmas, receiving a warm welcome.

“Back at work today since surgery. Excited to be on set of @ENews. I’ve missed my 2nd family (co-workers and you guys!!!) #thankful,” she tweeted on Dec. 27.

The couple appeared on the “Today Show” Friday to give fans an update on Giuliana’s recovery, and Bill couldn’t have spoken more highly of his wife.

“She wanted to turn a negative into a positive. If you can save one life through this process, it’s worth it,” he said.

Obama takes digs at birthers, GOP, his advisers

Obama takes digs at birthers, GOP, his advisers:WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama shared some words of wisdom on Saturday, saying there a few things in life harder to find and more important to keep than love.

“Well, love and a birth certificate,” Obama quipped at the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner, poking fun at those who question his place of birth. “I happen to know that my approval ratings are still very high in the country of my birth.” Obama was born in Hawaii, but birthers question whether he was born overseas.

Obama also jabbed Jay Leno, the comedian headlining the dinner. Obama dinged Leno as “the only person whose ratings fell more than mine.”

He said he was glad he spoke before the television host, “because we have all seen what happens when somebody takes the time slot after Leno.” Comic Conan O’Brien left NBC after his stint hosting “The Tonight Show” following Leno didn’t work out.

He took aim at his own administration too, cracking jokes about Vice President Joe Biden and his chief of staff Rahm Emanuel.

Republicans were also the victims of many Obama punch lines. The president noted Sen. John McCain’s claim this year that he was not identified as a maverick. “We all know what happens in Arizona when you don’t have ID. … Adios amigos,” Obama quipped, referring to a new law in the state that targets illegal immigration.

He wasn’t hesitant to mention the attention-hungry couple who crashed his state dinner last fall. “Odds are that the Salahis are here. There haven’t been people that were more unwelcome at a party since Charlie Crist,” he said about the Florida governor who decided to defect from the Republican party.

Although his poll numbers are down, Obama said he hears he’s popular on Twitter and Facebook. “Or as Sarah Palin call it, the socialized media,” he said.

Leno picked up on this joke to take a dig at Obama, saying the president isn’t as aloof as some critics say he is. “He loves to socialize – health care, car companies,” Leno said, naming a few industries where the Obama administration has intervened.

Obama also acknowledged the problems facing the Gulf coast after the disastrous BP oil spill. He plans to go to the Gulf Coast Sunday for a firsthand assessment on efforts to contain the massive oil spill from an offshore drilling rig.

Among the 3,000 guests on hand included Olympic gold medalist Lindsey Vonn, comedian Chevy Chase, actor Alec Baldwin, comedian Bill Maher, actress Michelle Pfeiffer, actor Dennis Quaid, former Secretary of State Colin Powell, GOP Chairman Michael Steele, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, White House senior adviser David Axelrod, the Jonas brothers and pop star Justin Bieber.

Hollywood heavyweights Michael Douglas and Steven Spielberg were seen chatting with Emanuel.

At the dinner, the White House Correspondents’ Association introduced students who received college scholarships.

Honored at the dinner were several journalists:

-Ben Feller of The Associated Press and Jake Tapper of ABC News, for winning the Merriman Smith Award for presidential coverage under deadline pressure. Feller won for his coverage of Obama’s unexpected late-night visit to Dover Air Force Base to honor fallen soldiers. Tapper won for his story that revealed tax problems of former Sen. Tom Daschle, D-S.D.

-Mark Knoller, of CBS News, for winning the Aldo Beckman award for sustained excellence in White House coverage. Knoller won for his work covering the White House for more than 35 years and in using multiple platforms to report.

-Suzanne Bohan and Sandy Kleffman, of the Contra Costa (Calif.) Times, for winning the Edgar A. Poe Award for excellence in coverage of news of national or regional significance. They were cited for a four-part series entitled, “Shortened Lives: Where You Live Matters.”

The White House Correspondents’ Association was formed in 1914 as a liaison between the press and the president. Every president since Calvin Coolidge has attended the dinner.

Eds: SUBS 12th graf to CORRECT spelling of Emanuel and Michael Douglas. Minor edits. Moving on general news and entertainment services.

Source: http://www.seattlepi.com/tv/1401ap_us_obama_correspondents.html?source=mypi

Times Square Shooting

Times Square Shooting:A plainclothes police sergeant fatally shot a 25-year-old man Thursday morning outside the parking garage of the Marriott Marquis Hotel in Times Square following a crackdown on street vendors who were using CDs to intimidate tourists, the authorities said. The man was armed with a loaded Mac-10 automatic machine pistol, the police said.
A major police response followed the shooting, which occurred around 11:15 a.m. at 46th Street and Broadway, a tourist-packed intersection, during a weekday morning when the streets were filled with shoppers.

Emergency medical workers took the man to St. Luke’s-Roosevelt Hospital Center, where he was first listed in serious condition. Paul J. Browne, the chief police spokesman, later said that the man had died. The man was not identified, but the authorities said he lived in the Bronx.

According to a law enforcement official who spoke on the condition of anonymity because an investigation had just begun, the officer was assigned to a detail charged with enforcing regulations governing street vendors and peddlers.

The official said the police officers were looking into reports of peddlers who had intimidated tourists with a ruse: They would approach the tourists, ask them their names, write their names on the CDs and then demand payment of $10.

The official said that the officer was approaching two vendors who he believed were perpetrating the scam. One of them fled toward the parking garage. As the officer gave chase, the man opened fired, shattering two glass windows of the hotel. The officer returned fire, mortally wounding the man.

The police said they recovered the man’s machine pistol at the scene. Investigators found 27 live rounds of ammunition in the gun, and one shell casing on the ground.

Shannon Maggio, 32, a visitor from New Orleans, was on the 16th floor of the nearby Edison Hotel in a room facing the Marriott, with both windows open, when she heard yelling, and then an eruption of gunfire.

“I heard it clear as day,” she said. “I’d never heard a gunshot before, but I knew it was a gunshot. Pow-pow-pow-pow — just like that. Then I heard a guy yell. Then sirens.” She added: “I froze. My hair stood on end.”

The first 911 call about the shooting came in at 11:19 a.m., and emergency workers arrived a minute later, the authorities said. Preliminary accounts indicated that the shooting occurred at the entrance to the garage, which is under the hotel. A street-level driveway runs under the hotel the length of the block between 45th and 46th Streets.

The hotel was sealed off after the shooting, and the police shut the entirety of Broadway from 45th to 46th Street to both traffic and pedestrians, and much of 46th Street to the east and west, as well.

“Right now, the police are on property,” Kathleen Duffy, a spokeswoman for the hotel, which has 1,900 rooms and is one of the city’s largest hotels, said in a phone interview from outside the hotel. “It’s our understanding it didn’t involve any of our guests or any of our associates.”

The intersection of 46th and Broadway is in the heart of Times Square. The hotel — and a giant Bank of America illuminated sign — is at the southwestern corner; a large new American Eagle Outfitters store is to the northwest; Father Duffy Square (and the TKTS booth that sells discounted Broadway tickets) is to the northeast; and a traffic island is to the southeast.

In the shooting’s aftermath, there did not appear to be significant alarm, at least as judged by tourists who, far from avoiding the area, seemed to push forward to get a view of what had happened.

Emer Rooney, 33, a visitor from Ireland on the last day of a trip to New York, walked with a friend from a nearby hotel to take pictures of the scene. She said she had never felt unsafe in New York. “I actually feel it’s very safe,” she said. “Look at all the police officers.” She cited the shooting, in fact, as one of the more exciting moments of her trip, including recovering lost luggage at the Port Authority Bus Terminal and getting tickets to the musical “Wicked.”

A tourist from Australia, Suzanne Davis, 42, stopped to take images with a video recorder. “It’s my first day in New York, so it makes very real what you see in the movies,” she said.

Nearby, vendors continued to sell tickets for double-decker bus tours.